Long, a ramble & some q's.

[Unregistered]

In my first game playing the germans I've had two leaders created. Somewhere on this site I found a ref that said leader's will be created out of elite combat about one time out of twenty. Well, the first leader happened fairly early. I used him to make an army. This enabled me to eventually build the heroic epic & mil academy. Later I was able to build the pentagon. Fairly shortly after building my first panzers I went to war w/ one of my weaker neighbors, they were probably ranked 13/16, I was 12/16. After the first combat victory, I entered my golden age. Ok, sez I, time to relax, develop & catch up in tech. (I was behind in tech & wonders, partially 'cause it took a while to figure out the budgeting of tech, & I spent too much time mucking about w/ army related small wonders) So I continue to pound on my victim, waiting for him to acknowledge my envoy, and after several more combats I get a leader. Well, I squirrel him away, cause I certainly don't need him to create an army, & there are only two great wonders left to build - the ones following genetics - and I've got a long way to go to get there.

To make a long story short, w/in two turns after starting the war I make a peace deal. That same turn england (polite) sails up to my main continent shoreline & unloads 3 cav from a trans & a destroyer (?maybe it was a battleship). During my next turn I protest, & I get the run-around 'cause they're not sitting right next to a city. I don't want to push the english too hard 'cause they're #3 of 16 & are in the modern era along w/ america & china (only these three so far) & they have a MPP w/ with the trading partner france that I've been cultivating for most of the game. We're trading a couple of strategic & a couple of luxeries between us, but no diplo deals. France is behind me in tech by a few advances, but ahead of me in cities, score & troops. England is on the far side of france, & france is not exactly my closest neighbor anyway. I can reach france by boat from the portion of persia that I've taken (which I also had to reach by boat) Next turn england declares war & starts vandalizing my railroads. I wipe up the cav w/ a coupla panzers, bomb the boats & sink one with my only battleship in the area. Why it is that bombers cannot sink ships...

Anyway, I did say I'd try to make it short, so: It's probably 50 turns later (so much for my golden age...) & I haven't been at peace since. England sucked america & china into the war against me, France was also drawn into it, (big hit on happiness there) I had to pay Japan (#4 on the board) to join an MPP w/ me to act as a spoiler against china & america (the three of them share the largest continent) Early in this mess I managed to sail over to france & take five cities in a couple of turns & got a peace out of them giving them back two cities & taking some $'s as well as a right of passage since france has no navy left and cannot reach my main continent. Not too long after this england dows france & using a force of about 28 tanks procedes to take about 15 of france's remaining cities (leaving them w/ around 8) while heading for me & my three city foothold on that continent. Meanwhile I'm sealifting & airlifting a strike force over there to deal w/ them. Thanks to the right of passage I procede to whittle down the english invasion force & retake all the french cities that they have so far taken, w/ a few more for good measure & give them all back to france. England eventually (7-8 turns?) makes peace w/ france & w/in the next turn has a right of passage w/ them (!!!????!!! The computer countries really should have *some* memory!!) enabling them to dump their (now reduced) invasion force of 22 tanks on my front doorstep. Using bombers & panzers I knock them down to 15, & most of those are damaged in one way or another. During the next computer turn most of the rest of their force is obliterated by the zulu, who are also at war w/ them & have a couple of cities (& a lot of cav) in the neighborhood. Next turn I finish up whats left, & in a couple of turns I'm at peace w/ them.

Well, this is turning into a rather long thang. Sorry.

Questions:

Has anyone else noticed this bias in the computer to go to war w/ you after your golden age starts? iirc civII did this as well... Perhaps it's my style of play.

Even tho I've been at war for about 50 turns & had many victorious elite units (& fwiw I'd say at least 25% of those ended up as 1 or 2 hit points remaining) I've never seen another leader. & I still have the 2nd one I got in storage, waiting for genetics. Has anyone else ever gotten another leader while still in possession of another one?

Anybody out there really use the armies seriously? After my experiences w/ them I'd say that they're not worth the effort/cost. I'd trade the whole feature in heartbeat for the ability to group & move stacks. They might be worth it if you could load & unload at will, but as it is I'll take four independantly attacking panzers anyday...

Cheers,

[Libertarian]

I haven't noticed a connection between golden ages and war. As for armies, they seem to be more useful with the early units who move one tile. It's a shame to put armor in them; it's like breaking Michael Jordan's knees and then watching him play.

[Rasputin]

i have received a total of 4 leaders during a war (warlord level) but never found any use for them!!!!

[Kolyana]

My most leaders were also with the Germans ... I had almost ten of them in all.

I had half a dozen armies: Mostly infantry and a wasted one when i piled it full of panzers. Gee, was that a waste of some good armor.

Ofcourse, I had two with knights that couldn't be upgraded, and the rest were awesome for rush building wonders. Start the wonder, move in a leader and finish that sucker in one turn ... it certainly helped me take the entire game and finish with my best score yet.

I even managed to use a couple to rush build temples in border towns,lol.

[Unregistered]

Thanks for the replys! Libertarian, good point, they are more useful in the early game. Nice MJ analogy too! Kolyana, good point, I should burn the one w/ horsemen on some improvement... Been using them mostly to keep cities from reverting...

Thanks all!

[Kolyana]

Originally posted by Unregistered
Thanks for the replys! Libertarian, good point, they are more useful in the early game. Nice MJ analogy too! Kolyana, good point, I should burn the one w/ horsemen on some improvement... Been using them mostly to keep cities from reverting...

Thanks all!

1) Leaders & Armies do not stop cities reverting. You just lose the army

2) Once a leader is an army, you can no longer use them to rush build anything. They are fairly useful for defense or, if seriously outdated, disband them in a city and they'll produce a useful amount of shields

[Evil_Eric_4]

I heard somewhere that there is a way to upgrade units in an army but dont remember how.

IMHO armies are completely useless.
Placing armour in an army negates the blitz function and placing inf in an army just creates an army that loses 3or 4 units in an attack instead of one.

pretty lame attempt at stacked combat

[Xentropy]

Originally posted by Libertarian
I haven't noticed a connection between golden ages and war. As for armies, they seem to be more useful with the early units who move one tile. It's a shame to put armor in them; it's like breaking Michael Jordan's knees and then watching him play.

Armies move at the speed of their slowest unit. As long as they contain ALL armor they still move 2 or 3 (std or modern). I have a calvary army that moves 3 and a tank army that moves 2 in my current game. The only thing you lose is the multiple attacks in a single turn ability of units that have it. The vastly increased hitpoints make it worth making an army or two, anyway, mostly to stack with your unarmied tanks for defense while the rest of the tanks blast two times a turn.

Originally posted by Kolyana
1) Leaders & Armies do not stop cities reverting. You just lose the army

Leaders and armies themselves don't do anything about defection, no. The units inside the army count along with the rest of the units, though, in lessening the chances of defection. I have yet to have a city defect since I started making sure they each have at least one unit with an attack rating (no leaders, workers, artillery, ships, or the like) or friendly-culture population point per enemy-culture population point.

i.e. Size 8 city, 6 enemy pop points, 2 friendly, need 4 units with an attack rating. Size 7, all enemy, need 7 units with an attack rating. There's still probably SOME chance of defection even doing this, but chances are VASTLY reduced. I used to lose nearly every city to defection, despite rushing libraries and temples immediately, because I only garrisoned one or two units in each city. Since I started garrisoning more, I have yet to have a defection in several long games with lots of warfare on Monarch. Yeah, there's a bit of a catch 22...if they DO defect you lose even more. But if you're going to war with less than 50 appropriate attack units for the time, you're screwed anyway (That's why I'd like stacked movement, damnit :>), and defection is extremely rare doing this.

[Unregistered]

Originally posted by Xentropy
Leaders and armies themselves don't do anything about defection, no. The units inside the army count along with the rest of the units, though, in lessening the chances of defection. I have yet to have a city defect since I started making sure they each have at least one unit with an attack rating (no leaders, workers, artillery, ships, or the like) or friendly-culture population point per enemy-culture population point.

i.e. Size 8 city, 6 enemy pop points, 2 friendly, need 4 units with an attack rating. Size 7, all enemy, need 7 units with an attack rating. There's still probably SOME chance of defection even doing this, but chances are VASTLY reduced. I used to lose nearly every city to defection, despite rushing libraries and temples immediately, because I only garrisoned one or two units in each city. Since I started garrisoning more, I have yet to have a defection in several long games with lots of warfare on Monarch. Yeah, there's a bit of a catch 22...if they DO defect you lose even more. But if you're going to war with less than 50 appropriate attack units for the time, you're screwed anyway (That's why I'd like stacked movement, damnit :>), and defection is extremely rare doing this.

I agree, since I've been putting as many units (w/ attack >= 1, artillery, etc don't count) in captured cities as there are population points, I haven't lost any more cities to defection either. If what you say about the friendly/unfriendly balance is true, then I may be using more than I need to be. I'll have to play around w/ this, thanks for the tip. & since my army of horsemen is pretty useless in the modern battlefield w/ modern armor & mech infantry running around they've been pretty much relegated to garrison duty. They do get to mop up the occasional workers & artillery though.

Thanks,

[gachnar]

I realize set strategies can ruin some of the fun, but I have fallen into a pattern with Leaders.

As soon as I get my first leader, he is escorted back to the nearest town (Funny thing, they seem to appear when there are enemy units nearby). I have him (her?) make an Army. The best offensive unit I have jumps in the Army, and it heads out to the front. When it gets there, it puts down the weakest unit it can find.

I now have a victorious army. I immediately start building the Heroic Epic in a moderate production city where I would like the culture bonus. If it takes 40 turns, its fine.

In the highest production city I have near my "tactical center" (A place that has easy access to the places I expect fighting to occur in the future, perhaps with quick access to a port), I immediately start building a Military Academy. This should be in a high production city because this city will pump out any of the armies you might want in the future.

So. Now you have no need to use leaders for armies, since you can build them in that city. Plus, the Heroic Epic will improve your chances of getting more Leaders.

I usually try to keep the first army alive. And pump out 2 more ASAP, so I can start production on the Pentagon. I usually dont use armies much until the modern age, when I army up 4 Infantry and sit them in cities that are heavily attacked.

Leaders all get escorted back to safety, where they rush build wonders in boarder cities, building up cultural pressure and making it harder for whoever my enemy is to hold my cities.

[Kolyana]

Unregistered and Xen, sorry, but I have to disagree.

In three different games, pre and post patch, I have lost cities that have been stacked with military units within. I'm not talking about ships or planes, but tanks, knights, infantry ... whatever.

Typically all instances were when the city was a captured one and it reverted back to the original owner. In all instances they were closer to the AIs capital than mine. I believe *that8 to be the main factor here.

In all instances I lost the stacks of troops from within.

a) Lost city to french and lost 4 knights with it.
b) Lost City to Americans over 50 turns after taking it. The Americans had been reduced to one city on an island of 1 square. I use this as an example of culture having bugger all to do with it, also. It's purely random. I lost 2 armies (both full with 4 units apiece) to this one.
c) Lost a Babylonian city after taking it off the Egyptians, back to the Babylonians. Lost 12 Mech infantry with this one.

In all games I lead the world with Culture and all cities had temples, colleseums etc. The American one chaps my ass the most, but there we go.

Golden rule?

Temples etc make no difference. Your culture makes no difference. The size or culture of your opposition makes no difference. The army within certainly doesn't.

[Xentropy]

Originally posted by Kolyana
Temples etc make no difference. Your culture makes no difference. The size or culture of your opposition makes no difference. The army within certainly doesn't.

I don't argue with anything you say until this paragraph.

Those things may not decrease the chances to ZERO, as I myself even stated. But they do REDUCE the chances. If you do nothing at all with that city, it WILL revert in 3 turns, 99% of the time. I found that to be VERY true. By doing the library/temple rush and having a decent culture and putting 2 or 3 units in the city, I've found that chance decreases to approximately 50%. If you put 12 units in the city, assuming it's a large city, the chances drop to 1%.

Not no difference. A ton of difference. Just not enough, since there needs to be some point at which the chance drops to zero.

[Dadeo]

In my last game I lost an American city to culture even though they had no cities on the map (an presumably no culture). There last remaining unit was a settler on a ship that was magically able to take back New York through its 'superior' culture. I had 5 modern armour in the city at the time. Go figure.